Bunk Bed Build

Hello friends, I invite you to join me on my newest adventure. I’m building some bunk beds for the kids. I contemplating buying them but after going to pottery barn kids and seeing pine bunk beds for $1,400 I talked the ol’ lady into letting me make them. I mean they even had planner tear out in them and everything to give them that rustic look. I can do better than that!
So here is the plan:
The wood is HD 2×6’s. I bought some plans online just to validate what I...

Wow I got a lot done yesterday. My wife and I also painted are bedroom in between woodworking sesions. She did the lower part of the walls, when she was done I’d go in and paint the top.
I’m sore today! But it feels good.
So I cut the legs to length by hand. The chop saw wasnt cutting accuratly enough for me so I cut these to length with a knife, a saw and my new bench hook.
Then took the #4 to the end grain.
Choped the Head and Foot board rails to length.
Then ...

Ok, here are a couple of more evenings of progress behind me. I need to cut 16 tenons total to fit the head board and foot boards on the two beds. This part of the project is going a little slower than the earlier parts. But I’m having fun on this part so its all good.
I first scribed a line all the way around the shoulder with a knife, then cut the v groove to guide my saw.
Sawed the shoulder, with my dovetail saw. I tried Paul Sellers advise here and used this saw even though it is a...

Hello again folks, the next step was to plow some groves in the stretchers and posts of the head board. The old Stanley #45 was the weapon of choice for this stage of the project which is a lot of fun to use. Here I am with the tool in action! In my head I look much cooler doing this.
The first challenge I had to overcome was the lack of a plywood sized cutter. As you are all aware ¾” plywood is slightly undersized so I had to use the next size down and then pair away the rest of the w...

Hello again folks. Here is the update on my project. I’ll let the pictures do most of the talking.
I experiment with new circ saw method. I just scored the first line and then eyeballed the second utility knife cut to the thickness of the blade. Then followed the line free hand.
Works Great! Very little tear out.
Those of you who follow the Workbench thread already know that I cut into my bench doing this. :-( So, I won’t rehash that here. Fixing that will have to be a separa...

Here is a little more progress on my build
Installing the brackets on the bed posts:
First I lay out the location of the Mortise with a mortising gauge. I need to get something better than this crappy Harbor Freight gauge but it does ok for now.
Chisel out the ends of the mortise with a chisel.
I start with my router plane set to full depth and work from one end back removing waste little by little.
#71 Action shot!
The smooth and crisp mortise is a beautiful thing. :-)
...

Hello again friends and thanks for following. In this installment I prep each of the panels (Head bard and Food Board) for glue up.
I’ve done a lot of work since my last blog but progress has been a little slow.
Before I glued up the panels I tested my dye/poly finish to make sure that pine and birch ply would look ok together. And it looks ok to me. Gives me that splotchy pine look my wife likes so much. ;-)
Then on to prep the panels for glue up. This consisted of planing an ...

Hello again all, I’m almost done with the bunk beds, At this point they are two twin beds.
Here is the stain I used which worked out pretty well.
I used Dark Walnut Transtint dye mixed with DNA.
I used DNA instead of water so I wouldn’t have to raise the grain first. However water may have worked better because it doesn’t dry as fast giving the stain more time to soak in. No real issues though I think it worked out.
The varnish used was MinWax satin poly in the round can thinned ...

Hello again folks, this blog aint done yet, I still have to finish the railings and ladders and make this thing a bunk bed.
I started a new job recently so I’ve been very busy, as a result, shop time has been limited and my picture taking has been lax. But I’ve got enough below to give you an idea of the process.
Nothing too ground breaking here and no galoot points when it comes to mortising.
Jointing one face and one edge so I can feed them through the thickness planer
...